Благотворение
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He does not demand from us that we perform miracles - this is God’s work, not ours, and it is impossible for us, for it is beyond our strength, but He demands that we love each other, and have mercy on each other, and give each other a helping hand. This is what both the union of Christianity and His holy will want, and this will be of great benefit to us. He who does good to the poor lends to the Lord, and He will reward him for his good deed (Proverbs 19:17). What could be more glorious than to lend to the Lord, and what could be more useful than to give into the hands of the One who has everything in his hands and who will reward the giver with great gain?
The fruit of love for one's neighbor is mercy and charity. From this it follows that those who do not love their neighbor have no love for Christ; they do not love him, because they do him no good. Worse than that are those who not only do no good, but also do evil to their neighbors. Such people, by persecuting and embittering their neighbor, persecute and embitter Christ Himself, although they do not notice it. Because whoever embitters a slave also affects his master; Every person is a servant of God.
Those who do good to others in order to be loved act disgracefully and suffer from self-love; and in this case, not for the sake of the name of Christ, but for the sake of one’s own benefit, charity occurs. He who truly loves Christ and does good to those who do not love himself, heeding the word of Christ: Give to him who asks you (Matthew 5:42).
Christians! Let us write this apostolic word, “while there is time” (see 1 Cor. 4:5), on our hearts. This is the time of real life: now we can only do charity and give alms - in the next century all this will cease. Let us now try to sow, so that we may then reap with joy; now work for good, so that then you can calm down; Here we will squander our estates in order to gather much more there; Let us give our gold and silver into the hands of the poor, so that we may then receive it with interest from Christ the Lord. Fear not, Christian! He who promised is faithful (Heb. 10:23). You give your silver into the hands of the poor, but Christ promised to give it to you for it and will give it to you in great abundance.